CHAPTER IV

WHAT IS DUTY?

It is necessary in the study of Karma-Yoga to know what duty is. If

I have to do something I must first know that it is my duty, and
then I can do it. The idea of duty again is different in different
nations. The Mohammedan says what is written in his book, the
Koran, is his duty; the Hindu says what is in the Vedas is his duty;
and the Christian says what is in the Bible is his duty. We find that
there are varied ideas of duty, differing according to different
states in life, different historical periods and different nations. The
term "duty", like every other universal abstract term, is impossible
clearly to define; we can only get an idea of it by knowing its
practical operations and results. When certain things occur before
us, we have all a natural or trained impulse to act in a certain
manner towards them; when this impulse comes, the mind begins
to think about the situation. Sometimes it thinks that it is good to
act in a particular manner under the given conditions; at other
times it thinks that it is wrong to act in the same manner even in
the very same circumstances. The ordinary idea of duty
everywhere is that every good man follows the dictates of his
conscience. But what is it that makes an act a duty? If a Christian
finds a piece of beef before him and does not eat it to save his
own life, or will not give it to save the life of another man, he is
sure to feel that he has not done his duty. But if a Hindu dares to
eat that piece of beef or to give it to another Hindu, he is equally
sure to feel that he too has not done his duty; the Hindu's training
and education make him feel that way. In the last century there
were notorious bands of robbers in India called thugs; they
thought it their duty to kill any man they could and take away his
money; the larger the number of men they killed, the better they
thought they were. Ordinarily if a man goes out into the street and
shoots down another man, he is apt to feel sorry for it, thinking
that he has done wrong. But if the very same man, as a soldier in
his regiment, kills not one but twenty, he is certain to feel glad and
think that he has done his duty remarkably well. Therefore we see
that it is not the thing done that defines a duty. To give an
objective definition of duty is thus entirely impossible. Yet there is
duty from the subjective side. Any action that makes us go
Godward is a good action, and is our duty; any action that makes
us go downward is evil, and is not our duty. From the subjective
standpoint we may see that certain acts have a tendency to exalt
and ennoble us, while certain other acts have a tendency to
degrade and to brutalise us. But it is not possible to make out with
certainty which acts have which kind of tendency in relation to all
persons, of all sorts and conditions. There is, however, only one
idea of duty which has been universally accepted by all mankind,
of all ages and sects and countries, and that has been summed
up in a Sanskrit aphorism thus: “Do not injure any being; not
injuring any being is virtue, injuring any being is sin.”

The Bhagavad-Gita frequently alludes to duties dependent upon

birth and position in life. Birth and position in life and in society
largely determine the mental and moral attitude of individuals
towards the various activities of life. It is therefore our duty to do
that work which will exalt and ennoble us in accordance with the
ideals and activities of the society in which we are born. But it
must be particularly remembered that the same ideals and
activities do not prevail in all societies and countries; our
ignorance of this is the main cause of much of the hatred of one
nation towards another. An American thinks that whatever an
American does inaccordance with the custom of his country is the
best thing to do, and that whoever does not follow his custom
must be a very wicked man. A Hindu thinks that his customs are
the only right ones and are the best in the world, and that
whosoever does not obey them must be the most wicked man
living. This is quite a natural mistake which all of us are apt to
make. But it is very harmful; it is the cause of half the
uncharitableness found in the world. When I came to this country
and was going through the Chicago Fair, a man from behind
pulled at my turban. I looked back and saw that he was a very
gentlemanly-looking man, neatly dressed. I spoke to him; and
when he found that I knew English, he became very much
abashed. On another occasion in the same Fair another man
gave me a push. When I asked him the reason, he also was
ashamed and stammered out an apology saying, "Why do you
dress that way?" The sympathies of these men were limited within
the range of their own language and their own fashion of dress.
Much of the oppression of powerful nations on weaker ones is
caused by this prejudice. It dries up their fellow feeling for fellow
men. That very man who asked me why I did not dress as he did
and wanted to ill-treat me because of my dress may have been a
very good man, a good father, and a good citizen; but the
kindliness of his nature died out as soon as he saw a man in a
different dress. Strangers are exploited in all countries, because
they do not know how to defend themselves; thus they carry
home false impressions of the peoples they have seen. Sailors,
soldiers, and traders behave in foreign lands in very queer ways,
although they would not dream of doing so in their own country;
perhaps this is why the Chinese call Europeans and Americans
"foreign devils". They could not have done this if they had met the
good, the kindly sides of Western life.

Therefore the one point we ought to remember is that we should

always try to see the duty of others through their own eyes, and
never judge the customs of other peoples by our own standard. I
am not the standard of the universe. I have to accommodate
myself to the world, and not the world to me. So we see that
environments change the nature of our duties, and doing the duty
which is ours at any particular time is the best thing we can do in
this world. Let us do that duty which is ours by birth; and when we
have done that, let us do the duty which is ours by our position in
life and in society. There is, however, one great danger in human
nature, viz that man never examines himself. He thinks he is quite
as fit to be on the throne as the king. Even if he is, he must first
show that he has done the duty of his own position; and then
higher duties will come to him. When we begin to work earnestly
in the world, nature gives us blows right and left and soon
enables us to find out our position. No man can long occupy
satisfactorily a position for which he is not fit. There is no use in
grumbling against nature's adjustment. He who does the lower
work is not therefore a lower man. No man is to be judged by the
mere nature of his duties, but all should be judged by the manner
and the spirit in which they perform them.

Later on we shall find that even this idea of duty undergoes

change, and that the greatest work is done only when there is no
selfish motive to prompt it. Yet it is work through the sense of duty
that leads us to work without any idea of duty; when work will
become worship — nay, something higher — then will work be
done for its own sake. We shall find that the philosophy of duty,
whether it be in the form of ethics or of love, is the same as in
every other Yoga — the object being the attenuating of the lower
self, so that the real higher Self may shine forth — the lessening
of the frittering away of energies on the lower plane of existence,
so that the soul may manifest itself on the higher ones. This is
accomplished by thecontinuous denial of low desires, which duty
rigorously requires. The whole organisation of society has thus
been developed, consciously or unconsciously, in the realms of
action and experience, where, by limiting selfishness, we open
the way to an unlimited expansion of the real nature of man.

Duty is seldom sweet. It is only when love greases its wheels that
it runs smoothly; it is a continuous friction otherwise. How else
could parents do their duties to their children, husbands to their
wives, and vice versa? Do we not meet with cases of friction
every day in our lives? Duty is sweet only through love, and love
shines in freedom alone. Yet is it freedom to be a slave to the
senses, to anger, to jealousies and a hundred other petty things
that must occur every day in human life? In all these little
roughnesses that we meet with in life, the highest expression of
freedom is to forbear. Women, slaves to their own irritable,
jealous tempers, are apt to blame their husbands, and assert their
own "freedom", as they think, not knowing that thereby they only
prove that they are slaves. So it is with husbands who eternally
find fault with their wives.
Chastity is the first virtue in man or woman, and the man who,
however he may have strayed away, cannot be brought to the
right path by a gentle and loving and chaste wife is indeed very
rare. The world is not yet as bad as that. We hear much about
brutal husbands all over the world and about the impurity of men,
but is it not true that there are quite as many brutal and impure
women as men? If all women were as good and pure as their own
constant assertions would lead one to believe, I am perfectly
satisfied that there would not be one impure man in the world.
What brutality is there which purity and chastity cannot conquer?
A good, chaste wife, who thinks of every other man except her
own husband as her child and has the attitude of a mother
towards all men, will grow so great in the power of her purity that
there cannot be a single man, however brutal, who will not
breathe an atmosphere of holiness in her presence. Similarly,
every husband must look upon all women, except his own wife, in
the light of his own mother or daughter or sister. That man, again,
who wants to be a teacher of religion must look upon every
woman as his mother, and always behave towards her as such.

The position of the mother is the highest in the world, as it is the

one place in which to learn and exercise the greatest
unselfishness. The love of God is the only love that is higher than
a mother's love; all others are lower. It is the duty of the mother to
think of her children first and then of herself. But, instead of that, if
the parents are always thinking of themselves first, the result is
that the relation between parents and children becomes the same
as that between birds and their offspring which, as soon as they
are fledged, do not recognise any parents. Blessed, indeed, is the
man who is able to look upon woman as the representative of the
motherhood of God. Blessed, indeed, is the woman to whom man
represents the fatherhood of God. Blessed are the children who
look upon their parents as Divinity manifested on earth.

The only way to rise is by doing the duty next to us, and thus
gathering strength go on until we reach the highest state. A young
Sannyâsin went to a forest; there he meditated, worshipped, and
practiced Yoga for a long time. After years of hard work and
practice, he was one day sitting under a tree, when some dry
leaves fell upon his head. He looked up and saw a crow and a
crane fighting on the top of the tree, which made him very angry.
He said, "What! Dare you throw these dry leaves upon my head!"
As with these words he angrily glanced at them, a flash of fire
went out of his head — such was the Yogi's power — and burnt
the birds to ashes. He was very glad, almost overjoyed at this
development of power — he could burn the crow and the crane
by a look. After a time he had to go to the town to beg his bread.
He went, stood at a door, and said, "Mother, give me food." A
voice came from inside the house, "Wait a little, my son." The
young man thought, "You wretched woman, how dare you make
me wait! You do not know my power yet." While he was thinking
thus the voice came again: "Boy, don't be thinking too much of
yourself. Here is neither crow nor crane." He was astonished; still
he had to wait. At last the woman came, and he fell at her feet
and said, "Mother, how did you know that?" She said, "My boy, I
do not know your Yoga or your practices. I am a common
everyday woman. I made you wait because my husband is ill, and
I was nursing him. All my life I have struggled to do my duty.
When I was unmarried, I did my duty to my parents; now that I am
married, I do my duty to my husband; that is all the Yoga I
practice. But by doing my duty I have become illumined; thus I
could read your thoughts and know what you had done in the
forest. If you want to know something higher than this, go to the
market of such and such a town where you will find a Vyâdha
(The lowest class of people in India who used to live as hunters
and butchers.) who will tell you something that you will be very
glad to learn." The Sannyasin thought, "Why should I go to that
town and to a Vyadha?" But after what he had seen, his mind
opened a little, so he went. When he came near the town, he
found the market and there saw, at a distance, a big fat Vyadha
cutting meat with big knives, talking and bargaining with different
people. The young man said, "Lord help me! Is this the man from
whom I am going to learn? He is the incarnation of a demon, if he
is anything." In the meantime this man looked up and said, "O
Swami, did that lady send you here? Take a seat until I have done
my business." The Sannyasin thought, "What comes to me here?"
He took his seat; the man went on with his work, and after he had
finished he took his money and said to the Sannyasin, "Come sir,
come to my home." On reaching home the Vyadha gave him a
seat, saying, "Wait here," and went into the house. He then
washed his old father and mother, fed them, and did all he could
to please them, after which he came to the Sannyasin and said,
"Now, sir, you have come here to see me; what can I do for you?"
The Sannyasin asked him a few questions about soul and about
God, and the Vyadha gave him a lecture which forms a part of the
Mahâbhârata, called the Vyâdha-Gitâ. It contains one of the
highest flights of the Vedanta. When the Vyadha finished his
teaching, the Sannyasin felt astonished. He said, "Why are you in
that body? With such knowledge as yours why are you in a
Vyadha's body, and doing such filthy, ugly work?" "My son,"
replied the Vyadha, "no duty is ugly, no duty is impure. My birth
placed me in these circumstances and environments. In my
boyhood I learnt the trade; I am unattached, and I try to do my
duty well. I try to do my duty as a householder, and I try to do all I
can to make my father and mother happy. I neither know your
Yoga, nor have I become a Sannyasin, nor did I go out of the
world into a forest; nevertheless, all that you have heard and seen
has come to me through the unattached doing of the duty which
belongs to my position."

There is a sage in India, a great Yogi, one of the most wonderful

men I have ever seen in my life. He is a peculiar man, he will not
teach any one; if you ask him a question he will not answer. It is
too much for him to take up the position of a teacher, he will not
do it. If you ask a question, and wait for some days, in the course
of conversation he will bring up the subject, and wonderful light
will he throw on it. He told me once the secret of work, "Let the
end and the means be joined into one." When you are doing any
work, do not think of anything beyond. Do it as worship, as the
highest worship, and devote your whole life to it for the time
being. Thus, in the story, the Vyadha and the woman did their
duty with cheerfulness and whole-heartedness; and the result
was that they became illuminated, clearly showing that the right
performance of the duties of any station in life, without attachment
to results, leads us to the highest realisation of the perfection of
the soul.

It is the worker who is attached to results that grumbles about the

nature of the duty which has fallen to his lot; to the unattached
worker all duties are equally good, and form efficient instruments
with which selfishness and sensuality may be killed, and the
freedom of the soul secured. We are all apt to think too highly of
ourselves. Our duties are determined by our desires to a much
larger extent than we are willing to grant. Competition rouses
envy, and it kills the kindliness of the heart. To the grumbler all
duties are distasteful; nothing will ever satisfy him, and his whole
life is doomed to prove a failure. Let us work on, doing as we go
whatever happens to be our duty, and being ever ready to put our
shoulders to the wheel. Then surely shall we see the Light!